tremulous little figure, 'I think I've done right in putting it
off till now. It's just as well you haven't gone up to Oxford till
after your trip on the Continent with me. That three months in
Paris, and Switzerland, and Venice, and Florence, did you a lot of
good, you see; improved you, and gave you tone, and supplied you
with things to talk about.'

'Why, you oughtn't to think I needed any improvement at all, sir,'
Edie answered, pouting; 'and as to talking, I'm not aware I had ever
any dearth of subjects for conversation even before I went on the
Continent. There are things enough to be said about heaven and earth
in England, surely, without one having to hurry through France and
Italy, like Cook's excursionists, just to hunt up something fresh
to chatter about. It's my belief that a person who can't find
anything new to say about the every-day world around her won't
discover much suggestive matter for conversation in a Continental
Bradshaw. It's like that feeble watery lady I met at the table
d'hote at Geneva. From something she said I gathered she'd been
in India, and I asked her how she liked it. "Oh," she said, "it's
very hot." I told her I had heard so before. Presently she said
something casually about having been in Brazil. I asked her what
sort of place Brazil was. "Oh." she said, "it's dreadfully hot."
I told her I'd heard that too. By-and-by she began to talk again
about Barbadoes. "What did you think of the West Indies?" I said.
"Oh," said she, "they're terribly hot, really." I told her I had
gathered as much from previous travellers. And that was positively
all in the end I ever got out of her, for all her travels.'

'My dear Edie, I've always admitted that you were simply perfect,'
Harry said, glancing at her with visible admiration, 'and I